Retort canning operations are engineered in many fashions, including still, batch, continuous, vertical, and horizontal designs. The retort canning operations all perform the same function, namely to thermally cook a canned product to a temperature suitable for sterilization.
An important aspect of almost all retort canning operations is the use of a cooling stage or process that cools the water that has seen used in the retort to cool the cans. During the cooling, the water may become fouled from ruptured cans or spilled foods. During the cooling, the water is also heated by the cans. During the cooling process, the seams of the can are very fragile, and the cans must be handled very carefully. The water used during the cooling stage must have a sanitizer to disinfect it in case the water is sucked into the can during the cooling stage. As such, choosing the right product for sanitizing is an important decision.
Traditionally, chlorine is the sanitizing product of choice for use during the cooling stage. However, chlorine has many substantial drawbacks. The use of chloride does not eliminate the need to use and maintain supplies of degreasers, dispersants or flocculants, and rust inhibitors. This is a very complex matrix of chemicals to manage in a cooling system. These chemicals are also very expensive, unsafe to handle, and require proper management of buying, ordering, and storage. These chemicals also require constant monitoring by trained personnel. Due to employee turnover, training must be constantly implemented to train new employees. Further, meters and testing equipment must be recalibrated and maintained. The maintenance of a typical retort cooling water system may cost hundreds of thousands of dollars annually in chemicals and labor.